Linked Languages Resources

Australian Aborigines Sign Language

asw

Many Australian Aboriginal cultures have or traditionally had a manually coded language, a sign-language counterpart of their
oral language. This appears to be connected with various speech taboos between certain kin or at particular times, such as
during a mourning period for women or during initiation ceremonies for men, as was also the case with Armenian Women's Sign
Language, but unlike Plains Indian sign languages, which did not involve speech taboo, or deaf sign languages, which are not
encodings of oral language. There is some similarity between neighboring groups, and some contact pidgin similar to Plains
Indian Sign Language in the American Great Plains. Sign languages appear to be most developed in areas with the most extensive
speech taboos: the central desert, and western Cape York. Complex gestural systems have also been reported in the southern,
central, and western desert regions, the Gulf of Carpentaria, some Torres Strait Islands, and the southern regions of the
Fitzmaurice and Kimberley areas. Evidence for sign languages elsewhere is slim, although they have been noted as far south
as the south coast (Jaralde Sign Language) and there are even some accounts from the first few years of the 20th century of
the use of sign by people from the south west coast. However, many of these codes are now extinct, and very few accounts have
recorded any detail. Reports on the status of deaf members of such Aboriginal communities differ, with some writers lauding
the inclusion of deaf people in mainstream cultural life, while others indicate that deaf people do not learn the sign language
and, like other deaf people isolated in hearing cultures, develop a simple system of home sign to communicate with their immediate
family. However, an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander dialect of Auslan exists in Far North Queensland, which is heavily
influenced by the indigenous sign languages and gestural systems of the region. Sign languages were noted in north Queensland
were noted as early as 1908 (Roth). Early research into indigenous sign was done by the American linguist La Mont West, and
later, in more depth, by English linguist Adam Kendon. Source : DBpedia